Baku City Circuit continues to offer us races full of twists. The Max-Lewis duel was repeated right from the start, but between the two quarrels it is Perez who enjoyed the benefits. He wins his second race in his career in front of a Sebastian Vettel which reminded us of his past glory and an amazing Pierre Gasly. The two Ferrari car slip down the order during the race, but Charles Leclerc manages to repair the damage at the finish line.
Let’s start right away by focusing on the initial stint of the race. The drivers in the top ten have all chosen to start with the Soft tire. The mediums did not give great results on Friday. In a few laps the tires of the rear axle tended to overheat and thus came out of the optimum window. From the first laps it was understood that the deterioration was less than expected. Most likely the teams went to protect the most stressed tires with the setup, in particular the right rear. This allowed the first stint to be extended by a few laps. Important laps which led to the teams being able to complete the race on a single stop. The Hard tyre was widely used by a large part of the grid. Hard tire is a High Working Range, similar to 2018 Soft . The higher temperature range it is capable of working with has made it the ultimate racing tire.
In a few laps Charles Leclerc was overtaken by many drivers on the main straight . The lack of power took away the possibility for the Ferrari drivers to have a good pace during the race, but you can’t just point the finger at the Power Unit. In the simulations on Friday the degradation of the rubber was very high. In the race the situation did not improve. Charles was even the first of the top to switch to Hard . As can be seen from the table below, the pace of the SF21 was not at the level of its rivals. On a probative track in terms of degradation, the Italian car has shown that it still needs to improve . In qualifying it is excellent in putting a lot of energy into the tires, however in the race it could have become a disadvantage. The slightly more exhaust aerodynamic package may also have affected the outcome. With a lower level of downforce the car tends to ‘slide’ more on the asphalt. This could have caused a lot of overheating.
Almost by eye you could see how Verstappen, from the early stages was able to have a better pace than Hamilton. The British Mercedes driver put a lot of his own into the Baku performance, managing to stay close to the Dutchman. Lewis often complained on the radio about how the car was a little biased towards the front. This contributed to greater degradation on the rear- mounted compounds . In Red Bull these problems seemed not to exist, on the contrary. The two bulls confirmed that they have a step higher than the rest of the grid in their pockets.
This made it possible to delay the stop for a few laps . Verstappen and Perez were the last two, among the top, to stop. As we had anticipated, the overcut was often used in the pits, outlining the strongest strategy . This strategy was also benefited by the fact that the front compounds just mounted at the pit stop struggled to keep up to temperature . Especially the Hard . As a result, the performance was not available immediately. What has been said can be verified in the race pace graphjust below, just look at how much better lap performance gets over the first few laps .
Even Gasly, thanks to the overcut , took the position on Charles Leclerc . A perfect weekend for the AlphaTauri . The Frenchman and his AT02 proved to be very kind to the softer compound . Vettel also gained a lot with the delayed stop . The German held his train of Soft for 18 laps. Using the Hard he continued to have a good pace, as Aston Martin seems to have managed very well the Pirelli on Azeri track. Stroll too, before his incident.
The second stint would also have been the last if it weren’t for the red flag. At this point Verstappen had a great pace, while Hamilton remained bottled up behind Perez, as Mercedes lacked a bit of inspiration to overtake the Red Bull motorized Honda. On the Ferrari front , the pace of both drivers improved once the Hard was mounted . The degradation was better managed, allowing the two Ferrari drivers to push harder .
McLaren was the big disappointment of this race. The British team with the Mercedes engine was thought to surprise. This was not the case and other points were given to the Maranello team. Norris still manages to get in the top ten at the finish, however it seems that the team could not find the right setup for the Azerbaijani track. The English driver found himself stuck behind Tsunoda , too fast on the straights to try to overtake. To conclude immediately behind the Woking team we find Alonso with his Alpine. The Spaniard in a ‘race crazy ‘ is always strong. The main problem of the French car on this track was activating the front tires . In the race, the disadvantage eased, allowing Fernando to fight for good positions .
Bottas and Sainz faced some difficulties compared to their teammates The Finn finished outside the points, while the Spaniard took home an eighth position . Starting behind, Carlos only found the pace in some situations while mounting the Hard, but an error immediately after his pitstop ruled him out of the top 5 battle.
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